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> Going to an office to write software is absolutely insane. Why? Writing software, especially in a large organization, is often an inherently social job, jus
by alecbz 5y ago
> Going to an office to write software is absolutely insane.
Why?
Writing software, especially in a large organization, is often an inherently social job, just like many others. You often need heads down time to actually get into flow and produce code, but that doesn't mean interaction with others isn't a significant part of it as well.
- LAC-Tech 5y agoLinux kernel team seems to manage fine. Or maybe they'd all do better if they were in a big open office with Linus Torvalds.
- alecbz 5y agoManaging fine is different than it being insane to go into an office. And I don't know on what basis we can conclude that it wouldn't be better if core Linux devs were working together. I don't know much about the nitty gritty of what kernel deving looks like, but it's possible that the work there looks more like longer stretches of heads down time than average. E.g., I can imagine you could be pretty impactful being heads down for weeks or months at a time micro-optimizing the performance of various components. I think this tends not to be true of most software. One thing I do know about the social dynamics of Linux development is that Linus can be an asshole and flame at people a lot. You could worry that this would be more intense and thus worse in an office, but IME this kind of stuff tends to get better once people can see each other as actual humans and not just text on a screen.
- madeofpalk 5y agoI think the overwhelming majority of software that's written does not need that much attention.
- alecbz 5y agoWhat do you mean by attention? I mean that e.g., software in large organizations often needs to fit in with the rest of the software the organization is writing, and that producing code is only part of the work; there's also working with others to find out what the right code to produce is.